Arc the Lad was among the first RPG games released in Japan for the Playstation. While other games made the jump across the Pacific, the Arc the Lad series remained behind and spun off sequels. Some six years after the first game Working Designs has brought over the entire series as a collection. This review will cover the first game in the series: Arc the Lad.

The Story

You're Arc and you're obviously a lad. Your father disappeared 10 years previous and you're on a mission to find out his fate. On the other side of the village, Kukuru is trying to escape her fate by putting out the Flame Cion that her clan has protected for 3,000 years. When she does it sets the wheels of fate in motion...

The Characters

Arc's father disappeared 10 years ago. Since then Arc has wanted to discover what became of his father. He trained with a sword so that he'd be ready when the day came for him to set out on his own.

Kukuru is a member of the clan sworn to protect the Flame Cion. She is also promised to marry the prince, a fate she Does Not want. In order to escape from the chains of tradition, she extinguishes the Flame and releases a horrible monster.

Poco a member of the army's marching band. When his unit is sent to destroy a group of monsters, he and Arc are the only two survivors. He joins Arc's party because he feels strong when Arc's around.

Tosh a swordsman who was loyal to the king and his clan until the king's minister ordered that his village be burned down. Outraged, Tosh turned away from the guards he so loyally served and sought revenge.

Gogen is an old man, actually a book if you believe what he says. He leads the party with his 3,000 years of wisdom from point to point on the map. (Somebody had to do it, right?)

Iga is from a remote temple where the fighting arts are practiced. He's not trusting of outsiders and will do anything to protect the ancient scrolls that belong to the Amaidar Temple.

Chongara is a greedy little man with a funny accent. He's a merchant by profession, and as a merchant, he tends to know things that have happened during the 3,000 years that Gogen was sealed in a rock. He also helps lead the party around.

Game Play

The game play is pretty straight forward since Arc the Lad lacks villages and an over world to wander around. Most everything is menu driven or selected from a map. So you'll spend most of your time in either menus or on the field map fighting.

Like Kartia and Saiyuki the characters and enemies are all on a field map and move around during their turn. The play is simple and requires very little by way of strategy. Simply get your character to the nearest monster and whack.

The only way to change your characters' attributes (besides leveling) is by equipping accessories into one of four available slots. The accessories didn't seem to make as much of a difference on the characters' battle performance as leveling did. A few levels can make the difference in this game. Not only do your stats go up individually, but the power of your special / magical attacks go up as well.

For the most part your party will be in a region of the game that is appropriate for your level. If you want, you can do additional leveling in optional dungeons / battlefields. I would only recommend this if you didn't want the game to be a challenge. A couple hours spent leveling will make the end of the game a cake walk.

Overall

When playing a game like Arc the Lad it's important to remember what other games were its peers: Wild ARMs and Beyond the Beyond. Arc the Lad isn't going to win any graphic contests by today's standards. Many of the monsters are color variations of the same design template. Some (like the bats) don't even bother with different color schemes; they're simply named differently when you place the cursor over them.

A game's soundtrack is one of those things that can more easily stand the test of time. Despite the limitations of the hardware, if a score is well composed it still sticks with you. Unfortunately, the only song that sticks with Arc the Lad is the opening theme. The rest of the songs are mundane and over played. But where the music falters the voice acting shines. Unlike the Lunar games, the voices were not dubbed into English. Admittedly, I didn't understand more than a few of the phrases, but they sounded appropriately pitiful when the character died or angry when they were performing an attack.

With the Lunar titles Working Designs had redesigned some of the menus to make them easier to navigate. I'm still wondering if they'd gone to the bother with this game or not. It took me over two hours to find where the options screen was, a feature that should always be on the main menu in my opinion. Just as frustrating was that by the end of the game I was still fumbling around the menus when I wanted to change my characters' accessories. With any other game I would have immediately turned off the command conformation menus, but with this one I needed them so that I could back out when I invariably hit the wrong button.

Despite these flaws there is one very good reason to play Arc the Lad: it's fun. The battle system is easy to understand and lets you jump right into the game. You move your characters around the field map and whack at the monsters. Attacking from the front increases the chance of them blocking or counterattacking, so side and back attacks are preferable. Every character has their own type of magic / special ability that can be used for healing or cutting down monsters in a wider swath. The only downside is that by the end of the game some characters are definitely more useful than others.

Arc the Lad isn't a long game; a straight run through will take around 10 hours. I would highly recommend this game to people who are new to the RPG genre and want to dip their toes into the water before diving in. The seasoned RPGer might be tempted to skip Arc the Lad and go straight to the second, lengthier game. The best reason not to skip this game is because the completed game save file can be loaded into Arc the Lad II to open up additional paths and secrets. If you want to get everything out of Arc the Lad II you have to do Arc the Lad first.

Reviewed by Greenbeans on April 21st, 2002